I started thinking about it, and now must offer the following:
How To Survive A Riddick Movie If You Are Not Actually Riddick
1. Be young.
2. Be intensely religious.
2a. But not a weird Goth religion.
3. Be Karl Urban.
4. Under no circumstances appear in the sequel.
4a. Unless you are still Karl Urban
5. If you are neither young, religious, nor Karl Urban, your best shot is to try for noble antagonist, which will give you at least a 60% shot, although one of those was Karl Urban, so it may be more like 30%.
5a. For a Riddick movie, 30% is still better odds than you’ll get anywhere else.
6. Sexy is a crap-shoot.* Best survival odds in this case are attained by being sexy somewhere in the vicinity of Karl Urban.
7. Do not be Furian.
7a. No, really. This is just a bad idea.
8. Do not taunt Happy Fun Riddick. If Happy Fun Riddick has explained he’s going to kill you, try turning your gun on yourself at once. Obviously you’ll still be dead, but the look on his face may be worth it.
9. If you wish to survive, have good teeth. Poor dental hygiene is a death warrant. Should you find yourself in the vicinity of Riddick, reach immediately for a toothbrush.
10. Under no circumstances should you allow Riddick to become in any way fond of you. This guarantees that you will sacrifice yourself nobly AND get a protracted bleeding-out scene.
10a. Fortunately, Riddick only becomes attached to other creatures off-camera. If you suspect that you are between movies or trapped in a lengthy time-passing montage, RUN.
11. Take the money.
12. If you are a mercenary, but not young, religious, or Karl Urban, you are almost certainly going to die. However, if you can start making wisecracks, you will live marginally longer, unless they are the sort of wisecracks that are a set-up for your hilarious death, in which case you just haven’t been paying attention at all. This will also work in any horror movies you happen to find yourself in. You will still die but you may have time to set your affairs in order first.
13. Space doesn’t kill people, alien planets kill people. (Also Necromongers, mercenaries, and Riddick. Also Karl Urban.) If you are in space, you are probably safe. Until you land on the planet.
14. Do not go to an uncivilized alien planet with Riddick. If you suspect Riddick is on the planet, find pressing business elsewhere before you land. If you find that, despite these precautions, Riddick is on the same planet you are, it’s already too late. The planet will try to kill you shortly.
14a. There are no herbivores in the Riddick-verse. Herbivores are not sufficiently manly. This works because apparently there are no plants in the Riddick-verse either. Plants are definitely not manly.
14b. It occurs to me, given that there are no plants, that everybody’s got to be seriously constipated, which explains a few things about the Necromongers.
15. If you are a Bad Person and shoot women, children, puppies, priests, captive populaces, etc, you are going to die. Always. Probably hilariously.
14a. Interestingly enough, though, you will not die until fairly late in the movie. This means that if the wisecracking mercenary slot is already filled, you may have a better survival chance by immediately gunning down all priests and/or puppies in the immediate vicinity, as you are guaranteed to survive until the last third or so of the movie. We leave what to do with this information to your own moral compass.
(Feel free to add your own in the comments.)
*Depending on what the director’s cut of Riddick 3 reveals, being either a lesbian or bisexual woman may up your survival odds considerably. We do not have enough data to speculate at this time.
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